Haplogroup

[3] More specifically, a haplotype is a combination of alleles at different chromosomal regions that are closely linked and tend to be inherited together.

As such, any related group of haplogroups may be precisely modelled as a nested hierarchy, in which each set (haplogroup) is also a subset of a single broader set (as opposed, that is, to biparental models, such as human family trees).

Neither recombines, and thus Y-DNA and mtDNA change only by chance mutation at each generation with no intermixture between parents' genetic material.

The overwhelming majority of a human's DNA is contained in the chromosomes in the nucleus of the cell, but mtDNA is an exception.

Effectively this means that the genetic material from these chromosomes gets mixed up in every generation, and so any new mutations are passed down randomly from parents to offspring.

Human Y chromosome DNA (Y-DNA) haplogroups are named from A to T, and are further subdivided using numbers and lower case letters.

[5] Y-chromosomal Adam is the name given by researchers to the male who is the most recent common patrilineal (male-lineage) ancestor of all living humans.

The most up-to-date version of the mtDNA tree is maintained by Mannis van Oven on the PhyloTree website.

The M group comprises the first wave of human migration which is thought to have evolved outside of Africa, following an eastward route along southern coastal areas.

Shortly after the migration, the large R group split off from the N. Haplogroup R consists of two subgroups defined on the basis of their geographical distributions, one found in southeastern Asia and Oceania and the other containing almost all of the modern European populations.

Likely due to much gene flow between the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula (Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman), separated only by a narrow strait between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

Below are subclades of R: B – Some Chinese, Tibetans, Mongolians, Central Asians, Koreans, Amerindians, South Siberians, Japanese, Austronesians F – Mainly found in southeastern Asia, especially Vietnam; 8.3% in Hvar Island in Croatia.

Here is a list of Y-chromosome and MtDNA geographic haplogroup assignment proposed by Bekada et al.

Note that the SNP counting of ancient DNA can be highly variable meaning that even though all these groups diverged around the same time no one knows when.